Woman's Hour Drama - David Golder - Episode 1

1/5 Irene Nemirovsky's classic novel of ruthlessness and ambition, love and money, translated by Sandra Smith and adapted for radio by Ellen Dryden. David Golder is a remarkable portrait of a man who is something like a monster, but whose killer instinct in business is based not in self-interest but in the almost pathological desire to provide for a family he knows does not care for him. Episode One: 1929, France. David Golder, a self-made businessman of 68, is rich and ruthless- and woe betide anyone who tries to cross him. Even if that person is his oldest friend and associate, Simeon Marcus. But on this occasion Golder's implacability in his business dealings has unforeseen and tragic results. David Suchet stars as Golder, with Anna Francolini (recently winner of the TMA/Stage award for the best stage performance of 2009) as Irene Nemirovsky. Nemirovsky was 26 when David Golder was published in 1929, and had made the same journey from a Ukrainian/Jewish background to France and wealth as her protagonist. The novel was a huge and immediate success .A film followed in 1930 but this is the first adaptation of the novel the Nemirovsky estate have allowed since. Irene Nemirovsky died in Auschwitz in 1942. She was 39. David Golder..............David Suchet Nemirovsky...............Anna Francolini Marcus.....................Robin Harvey Edwards Mme Marcus.............Julia Swift Directed by Peter Farago.